Olympic snowboarder settles suit over TV character

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (Reuters) - Olympic
gold-medal-winning snowboarder Ross Rebagliati has settled a
lawsuit over a television series that he had accused of
defaming him.

The Canadian snowboarder reached the out-of-court
settlement with CTV Television network and producers of the
series, "Whistler," according a statement released by his
spokesman on Friday.

Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

Rebagliati said he was defamed by a character in the
syndicated series named Beck MacKaye, who was portrayed as a
former Olympic snowboarder and resident at the Whistler,
British Columbia, ski resort whose death was linked to
alcoholism, womanizing and blackmail.

Rebagliati, who lived in Whistler when he won the gold
medal at the Nagano Winter Games in 1998, alleged the
"reprehensible" character was so similar physically and in
sports history that people thought the character was modeled on
him, or created by him.

"I am glad I was able to get my message out, as I have
worked very hard on my image since returning home from Nagano,"
Rebagliati said in the statement.

The show's producers had denied there was any link between
Rebagliati and the MacKaye character.

Rebagliati's gold medal in the 1998 Games, the first
awarded in an Olympics for snowboarding, was initially stripped
when he tested positive for marijuana. It was then returned to
him because the drug was not then a banned Olympic substance.

Rebagliati denied smoking marijuana, but said he may have
inhaled it as second hand smoke at a pre-Olympics party in
Whistler.